Tuesday, March 31, 2009

i came upon dooce.com many years ago while at UBC, and i adored her writing style in that flatly-stated-douglas-coupland kind of way. i've never been an avid, day-by-day follower of any blog, and when i rediscovered her blog years later, i was surprised to finally realize that people categorized it as a "mommy blog"......maybe i had first come across it pre-Leta, when it was just her, her husband and a photogenic dog, but to me, heather armstrong will always be just a woman who has an addictively stark, punchy writing style laced with tequilla and the F word.

so heather armstrong came to seattle this evening...actually, what's better, is she came to the suburb of lake forest park so i didn't have to battle traffic or parking downtown. i showed up in time to hear her addressing a large crowd with a passage from her book wherein she managed to use the word vagina about 10 times within a 2 minute time span. gone are the days of those small cue cards we used in school when giving presentations; she read off of something i could only possibly attribute to be a kindle.

afterward, she opened up the mic for questions, and after a few, a man who had never heard of her before stated so, and said that she'd managed to freak-the-heck-out-of-him about her inability to have sex for the 7 months after childbirth. the man got a roaring cheer from the crowd, largely comprised of what i could only fathom to be mommy-bloggers....but in the more traditional sense - less tequilla, less f-words... and i figured i was as good as any to follow up his act. i walked up to the mic and said i'd made her something because of anyone i'd ever met, i thought she'd really appreciate it. everyone "awwed" and then laughed when i politely presented her with a vagina pouch. i also said i hoped i'd gotten the right hair color, and all she could respond with was, "it's so hairy."

inevitably, her pronounciation of the word "crayon" was brought up, except i didn't realize it because i heard her say what sounded like "crown," and compared it to something that also sounded like "crown" in a southern drawl, and i instantly and incorrectly attributed it to some birthing process...because "crowning" exists, right?